


a man down a hole

by battleofthesurfraces



Series: gonna get you right [2]
Category: Tennis RPF
Genre: 2020 tennis season, ATP cup, Big boys do cry, M/M, is this hurt comfort if sascha hurts me and then I comfort myself by writing fic, the most cursed event
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-06
Updated: 2020-01-06
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:22:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22138528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/battleofthesurfraces/pseuds/battleofthesurfraces
Summary: Post that disastrous Saschanos ATP Cup match. Part of a series but can be read alone.He texts him as soon as he comes off court. It’s a stupid idea, but Stef has never been a man able to shrug off stupid ideas if they feel sufficiently heartfelt. Plus, his resolution in 2020 is to text more.
Relationships: Stefanos Tsitsipas/Alexander Zverev
Series: gonna get you right [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1593283
Comments: 5
Kudos: 41





	a man down a hole

**Author's Note:**

> This is me getting all my feelings out about the disaster that is the ATP Cup and the start of Sascha’s 2020 season. Basically, I want to hug and shout at him, and give him some kind and probably bad advice!!! And then hug him again. Ugh.
> 
> Part of a series but can be read alone - I just follow canon and by "canon" I mean "real life".  
> Obvs these are real people and this didn't really happen disclaimer etc. etc.

He texts him as soon as he comes off court. It’s a stupid idea, but Stef has never been a man able to shrug off stupid ideas if they feel sufficiently heartfelt. Plus, his resolution in 2020 is to text more.

You ok?

A few seconds later, three dots appear on screen - Sascha typing back - but no response appears before Apostolos shouts at Stef that’s it’s time to prepare to play doubles. Stef puts his phone down reluctantly, something heavy in his chest that settled there sometime in the first set and hasn’t really gone away since.

***

Apostolos makes a joke, as they warm back up, that he’s glad he and Stef don’t have such a turbulent relationship, and Stef can only smile weakly and look away. They had showed Sascha’s father’s tearful face on the big screen for a second on a changeover, and it had felt intrusive, unkind to be witness to that kind of pain, let alone knowing it was broadcast all over the world.

“Are you ok, you seemed a little distracted in that interview?”

“I’m fine, dad.”

Apostolos gives him a clap him on the back and a proud smile, the ‘well done’ implicit in the warmth that exudes from him. Stef knows having your family so intricately twined with your livelihood can be the best thing in the world. He supposes it can be the worst, too. He imagines his dad, tears in his eyes- upset, hurt, unsure. He pushes the thought away, and steps back out onto court.

***

Doubles is a three-set marathon, finishing late into the night. Sascha appears on the bench halfway through the tiebreak, and frankly it’s a huge fucking distraction. Becker looks exhausted and rattled, the other Germans look unsure even as they win the second set. At end of the second Stef had felt the previously ignorable pain in his chest pull on him, and they faced set point after set point as punishment for letting his focus waver thinking of the man in the press room. Stef could almost see him, hunched over the microphone, hair in his face. He mis-hits wide, and they lose the set. And then they lose the match.

Only once Stef consoles his teammates and finishes his elaborate cool-down routine does he check his phone again. He searches his notifications, for the one he’s looking for, and it’s there.

👍🏻

It’s a message, but beyond just an emoji it’s a shut down, an “I don’t want to talk about this with you”. The thing is, Stef’s not sure Sascha’s going to talk about this with anyone, ever. Laver Cup had gone some way towards helping Sascha, notching a couple of wins over Roger and Rafa in the last couple of months of the season, and he’d expected the exho tour with Roger to sort it out, or the off-season with his coaches. But 2020 had rolled around quickly, and judging by his play at the inaugural ATP Cup, Sascha’s second serve had only seemed to deteriorate.

Ok well I’m here if you want to talk about it.

??? You just beat me

Think you just beat yourself.

fuck off

No.

?????

Just saying ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯. I’m here all week.

Go away

I’m the one winning matches here.

1 match

Out of 3

🖕🏻

That’s more like it

***

Stef doesn’t see Sascha for the next couple of days. In fact, no one sees Sascha. There are whispers, Becker’s looking more exhausted by the hour, and apparently half-heartedly joked to Apostolos twice about both recanting his German citizenship and returning to play tennis so he could retire from coaching. By Tuesday afternoon, when Stef should really be practicing for his match against de Minaur, he’s instead hunting for Sascha, through the practice courts and the locker room, the bars and the beaches. His dad’s blowing up his phone, but his dad’s always blowing up his phone. His new years resolution doesn’t extend to his dad.

How a six-foot-six man who likes to yell at himself can hide in a relatively small tennis complex in Brisbane, Stef doesn’t know. He gives up.

Where are you?

You should be practicing

Did, now looking for you.

And so should you

I am. Service parking lot

??? You know you’re reasonably famous right

And have a match in like 4 hours

As do you

Come find me

Stef does, because he’s an idiot, and because he’s sure of the two of them, Sascha will be the one mobbed by fans if they stumble across them. Sascha’s hitting against a wall around the back of an out-building. Stef leans against the wall, catches the next ball Sascha bounces off the surface.

“This is some old-school tennis practice. Very Borg.”

“Nah, giving up tennis. This is me practicing for my new squash career.” Sascha is as unfairly handsome as ever, incisors peeking out from under his top lip as he grins at Stef, eyes squinting against the sun. He doesn’t look like the same man who’d been crying on court on Sunday. But there are dark circles under his eyes, and there are about forty tennis balls scattered around the parking lot, and he’s white-knuckling the racquet in his hand. Stef frowns,

“You know you still have to serve in squash, right?”

At that Sascha hits another tennis ball (seriously, where are they all coming from?) against the wall. He’s kind enough to aim it away from Stef.

“I can serve.” Sascha bounces another tennis ball on the ground, tosses it, serves. The ball ricochets off the wall with ferocity, disappears far into the distance behind them. Despite the lack of actual tennis court, his serve is technically perfect, and fast as hell. Stef looks around to make sure no surrounding cars had been unwittingly damaged by Sascha’s clear frustration before he’d arrived. Thankfully the parking lot is fairly empty, and all visible cars are intact.

“I just can’t… second serve? In a match? Something’s gone wrong, and I can’t fix it. No one can fix it. And I can’t win without my serve.” Another ball is flung at the wall at 140mph.

“Thought you didn’t want to talk about it.”

Sascha smiles again,

“Not talking about it.” Another ball. “Just playing squash.”

“Do you know how to play? Actually.”

“Of course.” Like the idea he doesn’t know how is offensive.

“Alright, let’s go then.” Stef picks up a spare racquet of Sascha’s off the floor.

They play a single game, 10-12 to Sascha, admittedly because Stef can’t remember how to play, or how the scoring system works, at all. It’s ridiculously fun even as Stef prays that no one finds them- two top-10 internationally ranked tennis players, playing an awful game of fake squash against a wall in a service parking lot. The risk is worth it though, because at the end of it- when Sascha has completed his jokey victory lap of the car park- Stef has an excuse to drink in the sight of him standing in the early afternoon Australian sun, hair curling around his face, a sun that can nearly be matched in brilliance by Sascha’s wide grin.

“Good game.” Stef can be a sore loser, but not today. He’s not aware of the soft smile on his face that would betray his feelings to any casual onlooker, one that Sascha can’t help but trust in wholly and unreservedly.

“No one cares about squash.”

“That’s a bit mean-“

“There are no squash Grand Slams, almost no one can name a top-10 squash player, there’s less demand, fewer onlookers.”

A pause as Stefanos catches up.

“Less pressure.”

“Yeah.” Sascha picks at the racquet tape. Stef sighs.

“I think you’d put yourself under immense pressure any sport you played.”

“Thanks for the reassurance.” A pained smile.

“It’s just who you are. Who we are, we didn’t get here by not caring a horrible amount.” Sascha closes his eyes, bringing the racquet up in front of him, fingers playing across the strings - a high-strung cage.

“I just want to play good tennis. When I was a kid, playing with Mischa, with my parents, I never expected this. I’m so frustrated, all the time. It feels like it’s destroying me.”

“It won’t destroy you.”

“Hm. Less competition for you.”

“Don’t say that. Anyway, I’d get there without you.” Sascha scoffs, but it reminds him of something Roger had told him, in an airport lounge in November, and he listens. Stef looks directly at him, straight into the sun,

“I’d like to get there with you.” The confession is heartfelt and sincere, like almost everything Stef ever says, and it spans and closes the months between now, January 2020, where they stand- confused and alone in a country on fire - and when they first met in 2010 at the Orange Bowl - under the same blazing sun, a decade, an adolescence and half a world away. Sascha can’t look away, but he also can’t do **this** either, not now. His heart physically aches, he’s two matches into 2020 and exhausted, stuck in a rut, has dug himself deep into a stupid, dark hole, and here’s a lovely, weird, kind man, offering to jump in beside him. He drops the tennis racquet, covers his eyes and takes a deep breath to stop himself from sobbing.

Stef’s experience with heartfelt confessions has usually been slightly better than immediate tears, to be honest, but Sascha’s going through some shit so he doesn’t take it too personally. He crosses the few feet between them to wrap his arms around the other man, who clings back and tucks his face into Stef’s neck, eyes squeezed shut and breathing jaggedly. It’s all a bit awkward- Stef has never seen such a display of negative emotion from Sascha off-court, and they’re physically closer than they have been since the win in Geneva.

“Hey, it’s ok. Everything’s gonna be alright.” Sascha chuckles wetly.

“Please don’t start singing No Woman No Cry for me.”

“Hmm. Okay.” Stef hums into Sascha’s neck as the other man sniffles. He doesn't really know what to say. “I miss your glasses.”

“You do?”

“Yeah.”

“I miss your beard.”

“Hm, too hot here for beards. Later in the season, maybe.”

“Boston?”

“Definitely Boston.”

They stand for another minute in comfortable silence as Sascha pulls himself together. They pull apart, Sascha discreetly wiping his nose on the back of his hand, self-consciously folding his arms- folding back in on himself, retreating. They drew a line in the sand, back in the autumn, in the wake of Laver Cup, a line that had now been crossed.

“Why do you care?” Even before he speaks Sascha know it’s a stupid question - at this point they both know the answer, and also know that the answer must continue to remain unspoken. Without anyone else around though, this moment can potentially remain suspended, out of time, and so Sascha asks the stupid question. But Stef still flinches, looks away, fudges.

“We can’t have a great rivalry if you keep playing like this. You have some catching up to do head-to-head wise already.“

Sascha smirks, but there’s kindness in it, and surprisingly the comment doesn’t smart at all.

“So this is all about you?”

“Sure, if you want it to be.” Stef clears his throat. “Or, I don’t know, maybe I’m a nice person, and I care about you?”

“Ok.”

“Ok.”

“I think your dad’s probably looking for you.”

“Oh, he always is. And you should probably pick up some of those balls.” Sascha looks around, and laughs, a bright peal of laughter, astonished at the mess he’s created.

“Yeah, better clean this up. Might take a while.” Sascha’s not talking about the balls. Stef smiles, picks one up, tosses it into the air and catches it deftly. 

“It’s ok, I’ll wait for you.”

And he does.

**Author's Note:**

> I have never seen someone who needs a sport psychologist/psychiatrist more, other than me at age 20 haha. I feel you, dumbass. Here's to a better 2020 going forward. 
> 
> Title is from that old parable about a man down a hole that I know from the West Wing episode Noël: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GorYkK7RgMs
> 
> Please leave kudos and a comment if you would like to! And if you have some spare cash, please donate to Australian Red Cross.


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